


tenderly, tragically, beautifully

by almostafantasia



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst, Cancer, F/F, clarke has non-terminal cancer, mentions of chemotherapy and side effects but nothing particularly graphic, this is more about the emotional effects of cancer than the physical ones
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-17
Updated: 2018-03-17
Packaged: 2019-04-03 20:54:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 14,681
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14004567
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/almostafantasia/pseuds/almostafantasia
Summary: In which bad things happen to the people who deserve them the least and Lexa learns that although cancer can be treated, the scars it leaves behind take much longer to heal.





	tenderly, tragically, beautifully

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: It should probably be noted that I personally do not have cancer, nor have I ever suffered from it. This story was written a while ago as a means of coping with watching somebody that I love deal with cancer and chemotherapy at a young age. Cancer is different in every person that it affects and the symptoms, treatment, and emotional side effects that Clarke experiences in this story are merely a reflection the cancer that I have witnessed.
> 
> I’m also going to reassure you before this story starts that nobody dies. This is not intended to be a tragic story, merely an exploration of a non-terminal cancer diagnosis on a young person and their future.

She feels as though every pair of eyes is watching her from the moment that she steps through the school gates. Which is just paranoia at its absolute finest because the reality is that not a single person is actually looking at her, but with the very obvious way in which the other kids are deliberately trying not to stare at her as she walks up to the red brick school building, Clarke might as well have a giant flashing sign above her head.

A giant flashing sign reading  _ this kid has cancer _ , with a vertical neon arrow pointing down at her.

Clarke knows that they all know. Even if Raven hadn’t already filled her in on everything that happened while she was in the hospital, this is high school so gossip spreads faster than a race car speeding around an asphalt track.

“Yo.”

Raven makes an unnecessarily loud entrance, clattering into the row of lockers beside Clarke’s and dropping her shoulder bag to the floor with an unceremonious thud. It catches the attention of those nearby, but upon realising that Clarke is there, those heads quickly turn away for fear of being caught staring.

“Everyone’s treating me like I’ve got a deadly virus. It’s cancer, it’s not contagious!”

She raises her voice with this last bit, startling the group of freshman boys who cross to the other side of the corridor in order to give Clarke a wide berth as they pass.

“Clarke,” Raven hisses, resting a comforting hand on Clarke’s shoulder.

“I’ve been here for two minutes and I already wish I was back in that stupid hospital,” Clarke complains through clenched teeth, taking a heavy textbook out of her bag and throwing it into her locker with slightly more force than actually necessary.

“They probably all heard the word ‘cancer’ and assume that you’re on your deathbed,” muses Raven.

“I’m not.”

“I know,” Raven agrees, as she reaches out to give Clarke’s fingers a reassuring squeeze with her own. “You’re going to be fine, you’ve just got a few shitty cells in your body.”

“John Murphy’s got more shitty cells in his body,” Clarke comments, as the shaggy-haired boy saunters past the two girls with his hands buried deep in the pockets of his leather jacket, giving Clarke the side-eye as he passes.

“Well unlike Murphy, your shitty cells are going to be killed by the chemo. He’s stuck with his for life.”

Clarke appreciates what Raven is trying to do, but that doesn’t mean that it works. As grateful as she is for her best friend’s insistence that she’s going to survive this new obstacle in her life, it doesn’t really detract from the fact that she has months of having her body pumped full of chemicals to get through first.

“Raven…”

“What? I’m just letting you know that I’m sticking by you no matter what.” With a wicked smile, Raven adds, “I’ll always be your best friend, even when you go bald.”

“Oh god, don’t remind me,” Clarke whines, shutting her locker and turning around to lean against it dramatically.

“You finish treatment just before Thanksgiving, right?”

“Yes,” Clarke nods, wondering in which unpredictable direction Raven’s train of thought is heading this time.

“So you’ll be rocking the cutest pixie cut in town by Christmas.”

Clarke lets herself imagine it for just a second. She hasn’t had her hair shorter than shoulder length since a disastrously bad haircut at the age of ten, but when she pictures herself with much shorter hair, barely long enough to curl ever so slightly around her ears and the top of her neck, she smiles slightly. Mostly at the realisation that with virtually no hair to have to deal with each morning before school, she’ll be able to get out of bed a whole fifteen minutes later than usual, but also at the thought that with minimal effort and a bit of strategically placed styling cream, she can probably make herself look hot as fuck.

“Thanks Raven,” Clarke smile gratefully.

But Raven’s brain is always moving way faster than Clarke is able to keep up with and she’s already onto the next thing.

“Hey, do you think the chemo is going to give you superpowers? Wouldn’t it be awesome if you got x-ray vision or invisibility or something even cooler?”

“ _ Raven… _ ”

* * *

Class is weird. Raven walks her to the door of her classroom like a mother dropping her young child off for the first day of kindergarten, and when Raven departs with a final wave over her shoulder, Clarke feels exactly like that scared five year old, out of her depth in a world that seems far too big for her.

It’s pretty much exactly the same routine in the classroom as it was out in the school corridors, except that now, in this more confined space, Clarke can’t really do much to pretend she hasn’t noticed how everybody is behaving around her. Each pair of eyes fall onto her as she passes, then glance away when they realise who has just walked by.

And then the hushed muttering starts. Clarke’s classmates must be seriously misinformed about the symptoms of cancer if they think that she isn’t able to hear the whispering as she makes her way to her usual seat on the far side of the classroom.

As the clock on the wall just above the teacher’s desk slowly ticks away towards the start of another day at school, the desk next to Clarke remains empty. Finn Collins, the desk’s former occupant, who Clarke is ninety-five percent certain was flirting with her in the few weeks leading up to the discovery of the tumour in her back, has moved to a previously empty seat in the back row next to Atom. It’s too much of a coincidence for Clarke to blame this on anything but the cancer. Who would want to flirt with her when there are plenty of other much prettier, much healthier girls in the school to flirt with, all of whom are still going to have a full head of hair in a few months’ time?

“Hey.”

Ten minutes into her first day back at school and already so used to being treated like a bomb that is waiting to go off, Clarke actually startles in her seat a little bit when the girl in the seat in front of her turns around to say hello.

“Oh, hi Lexa!”

Lexa Woods was Clarke’s elementary school best friend until the two of them slowly drifted apart as they grew up and their interests changed. Not to say that they no longer get along, but that they move in different circles now, with nothing more than a polite smile if they pass in the school corridors.

Until now.

“This is for you.”

Clarke’s eyes widen in surprise, then her entire face twists into a confused frown as Lexa places a thick ring-binder down on Clarke’s desk, upon which lies an envelope.

“Um, thanks,” Clarke replies tentatively, picking up the envelope and sliding her finger into the small gap at the edge to tear it open and remove its contents.

It’s just a card, white with pastel coloured butterflies surrounding the embossed words ‘ _ thinking of you _ ’ in a pretty cursive font. Surprised, Clarke flips it open to read the message inside.

_ Dear Clarke, _

_ Wishing you all the best over the coming months for a speedy recovery. _

_ Lots of love,  
Lexa xx _

It’s pretty much exactly the same as the twenty other cards she has at home from various relatives and friends of the family, empty words that don’t really detract from the potentially life-threatening illness that resides in her body, but it somehow means so much more coming from Lexa than from anybody else. Coming from Lexa, who could quite easily have done exactly the same as Finn and everybody else in this godforsaken school and blatantly avoided having to go anywhere near the girl with cancer.

“And this is everything that you missed while you were in hospital,” Lexa continues, opening the folder to display the thick wad of handwritten notes inside, neatly colour-coded and underlined and separated into subjects by labelled dividers.

“Lexa, what the…?”

“You missed two weeks of school and you must be really behind in all your classes so I wrote out my notes again so that you could have a copy,” Lexa explains hurriedly, a pink flush rising to sit on her sharp cheekbones. “If there’s anything you don’t understand when you read through it, I’d be more than happy to go over it with you.”

“Lexa,” Clarke sighs, feeling a rush of affection for her former best friend as she flicks through page after page of Lexa’s impeccable handwriting, laid out under clear capitalised titles and broken up with nearly drawn diagrams and tables. “You shouldn’t have.”

“It was good revision for me,” Lexa shrugs, as if the gesture is insignificant.

“Wait,” frowns Clarke, as she reaches one of the coloured dividers and enters a different subject, “do you even take Chemistry?”

“No, but I know Monty through the debate club so I borrowed his notes and copied them out,” Lexa answers. “They might not make much sense because I didn’t understand a lot of it but I’m sure that Monty would be able to explain it if you need help…”

“Lexa, this must have taken you  _ hours _ …”

“Yeah, well you’ve got cancer, it’s the least I can do to help.”

The word hits Clarke like a fist in the gut. It’s been two weeks since the diagnosis, two weeks where Clarke’s mind has been consumed with nothing but that one singular word going around and around in her mind until she’s half crazy. But Clarke realises that maybe the problem is that the word has  _ only _ been in her head since the diagnosis – nobody around her has been brave enough to say the word aloud since the doctor who gave her the bad news two weeks ago. Even her mother, a doctor herself, skirts around the word at home, as if saying it out loud makes the whole situation far too real to comprehend.

It’s just a word, it shouldn’t hurt so much.

Except that it’s not just a word anymore, it’s a way of life. It’s chemicals being pumped into her body, and being ignored by even those who used to flirt with her, and the inescapable unsettling worry that despite the assurances of the oncology nurse, maybe she isn’t going to make it to the other end of this ordeal with her life.

“Sorry, did I say something wrong?” Lexa’s voice pulls Clarke out of her thoughts with a lurch, and she shakes her head to focus herself back in the real world.

“No, it’s just…” Clarke tries to explain, her voice just a croak as she tries to push past the lump that forms in her throat. “It’s still quite new to me.” Trying to articulate aloud for the first time, Clarke continues, “It’s weird because it’s all I think about but it still takes me by surprise sometimes. I’m so used to everybody skating around it like they want to pretend that it’s not happening, so it surprised me how forward you were.”

“Sorry,” Lexa mumbles, bowing her head apologetically. “I shouldn’t have…”

Reaching out a hand to touch Lexa’s shoulder in reassurance, Clarke says, “Lexa, it’s fine, I…”

But she doesn’t get the chance to finish. The classroom door clatters open as the teacher enters to start the lesson, and within an instant Lexa is facing the front once more with wide, attentive eyes.

The teacher’s eyes scan the classroom as his voice fills the room to get their attention, but he stumbles mid-sentence when he spots Clarke in their midst. There’s a moment that feels like an eternity, a moment in which Clarke knows the teacher is trying to decide whether to acknowledge Clarke’s return to his class, a moment in which Clarke wants nothing more than to melt into the hard plastic chair as if she has never even been here at all, but then it passes, and the class continues as if nothing has happened.

As if Clarke doesn’t have cancer.

But she does.

“Lexa,” Clarke hisses, when the teacher turns his attention to the computer and pulls up a powerpoint presentation for the lesson. Lexa turns around to frown inquisitorially at Clarke, who forces the resentment out of her mind and the sadness from her eyes as she smiles gratefully at her former best friend. “Thanks for the notes.”

* * *

 

Lexa thinks about it a lot, probably way more than she should think about somebody who she so rarely speaks to these days, but it really plays on her mind. Why somebody so young, somebody with such a bright future, somebody with so much joy and happiness and vitality should get diagnosed with cancer when there are so many bad people in this world that it could happen to instead.

It sucks, and Lexa isn’t even the one with cancer.

She almost wishes that she was. And yes, she knows that’s a terrible thing to think and that she should be grateful for her own good health, but it’s the truth. If there was a medical procedure that could suck the illness from Clarke’s body and transfer it to her own, then that’s exactly what Lexa would do. Clarke has everything; a big friendship group full of nice people that nobody in their year group seems to dislike, good grades, good  _ looks _ , and an aspiration to be a doctor. Lexa, meanwhile, feels as though she has nothing in comparison - only a few people that she would consider friends, two parents who somehow manage to straddle the line between loving her too much and not loving her enough, and an unhealthy dose of anxiety. It should be her that has the cancer, but instead there seems to be an unjust system of reverse karma in place, where bad things happen to good people.

There are bad people in the world, and there are good people. And then there is Clarke. Clarke, who is so good and pure that Lexa isn’t entirely convinced that she isn’t an actual angel reincarnated in human form. Clarke, who on the second day of kindergarten, helped a tearful and bruised Lexa back to her feet after being pushed to the ground by John Murphy, then declared them to be best friends for life, though only after kicking Murphy in the balls for hurting Lexa in the first place.

Nobody deserves to be diagnosed with cancer less than Clarke.

Lexa almost wonders if Clarke’s illness is karma punishing _her_. Perhaps fate is saying a massive _fuck_ _you_ to her, not to Clarke, by forcing her to stand by helplessly as the girl she loves suffers. Because there is absolutely no doubt that Lexa does love Clarke. She’s known it for about a year, though she’s probably loved her since the day that six year old Clarke offered out a hand to help Lexa get back to her feet.

But what hurts the most is knowing that there’s absolutely nothing she can do to help Clarke, nothing she can do but sit by and watch as Clarke’s health deteriorates and the side effects of chemotherapy kick in.

Lexa has never felt more helpless.

* * *

Lexa almost doesn’t recognise the girl who walks into class the following Thursday morning with bright pink hair. Nothing has changed other than the hair colour – she wears the same worn out jacket she’s owned since freshman year, the same slightly pitiful frown that’s been on her face since the diagnosis a couple of weeks ago – and yet the vibrant pink that frames Clarke’s face makes it seem like she’s an entirely different person from the girl with the beautiful golden tresses that Lexa has known for most of her life.

“Clarke!” Lexa gapes, as Clarke drops into the seat beside her, Lexa having moved back a row now that Finn Collins has taken up his new seat at the very back of the classroom. “I –  _ wow _ !”

Though Lexa, quite deliberately so, does not ask for an explanation for Clarke’s sudden and drastic makeover, Clarke gives her one anyway, as if she feels like she has to justify her new fashion choice.

“I’ve always wanted to dye it,” she shrugs, reaching up with one hand to play with a single pink curl, “and I might not have hair for too much longer so it seemed like as good of a time as any to get it done.”

As Clarke glances away, a brief moment of sadness passing across her face as she does so, Lexa’s insides lurch unsettlingly at the thought of Clarke’s hair falling out against her will. She quickly remembers that Clarke will be taking the day off school tomorrow for the first of many chemotherapy treatments, which explains the unexpected change of hair colour mid-week, and just tries to imagine for a second how terrified Clarke must be at the prospect of going into hospital for such a daunting treatment.

Lexa flails silently for a moment, wondering what, if anything at all, she can say that might ease Clarke’s mind ahead of her hospital visit but nothing comes to mind that won’t do more harm than good. Lexa settles instead for saying something a little different.

“The pink really suits you.”

Eyes wide with surprise as she lifts her head to look up at Lexa, as if she hadn’t been expecting the compliment at all, Clarke softly mumbles, “Thanks,” before reverting back into a glum silence for the rest of class.

* * *

Clarke’s absence on Friday, despite her only sharing a couple of classes with Lexa, feels somewhat akin to Lexa having to spend the day without one of her arms. She’s a mess for pretty much the whole day, distracted with pondering thoughts of where Clarke is, of what the doctors will be doing to her, and of hoping that none of it is as bad as the scary word  _ chemotherapy _ makes it all sound.

When she arrives home from school that afternoon, Lexa collapses on her bed with her phone in her hand, the screen unlocked and opened on a message conversation with Clarke, but she hesitates with her thumb hovering over the keyboard before she sends anything. Nothing that comes to mind quite seems right for the situation - casual well-wishes seem too impersonal and asking how the treatment went seems far too invasive and unsympathetic.

Lexa exits the conversation and locks the phone with a sigh, shaking her head in dissatisfaction. She wants to be there for Clarke, she really does, but there’s no class at school for how to be a good friend to somebody with cancer and it’s not really something that Lexa can do on intuition alone.

She decides, forty minutes later and after some assistance from her mom, on a simple Facebook post; an old photo of the two of them with their arms around each other and toothy grins on their faces at Clarke’s eighth birthday party, which she captions “ _ Found this looking through some old stuff - partners in crime since kindergarten! _ ” and then tags Clarke in it. Nothing fancy. It’s simple, it’s irrelevant, and it will hopefully let Clarke know that Lexa has been thinking about her all day.

She definitely  _ doesn’t _ spend the next few minutes eagerly refreshing her new feed, waiting for a notification that lets her know that Clarke has seen the post.

It never comes.

She doesn’t know what she was expecting, if not a comment then perhaps at least a like, but each time the little red bubble pops up in Lexa’s notifications, it is with somebody else’s name and not Clarke’s. A selection of school friends like the post, both from their high school and old friends who knew the girls back around the time that the photo was taken. Some names are ones that Lexa doesn’t recognise, presumably friends of Clarke’s from elsewhere. Octavia Blake reacts to the post with a red heart that Lexa wishes came from Clarke instead.

The first comment is from Raven; “ _ Double denim? Griffin, you were such a style icon! _ ”

It hurts more than it should, two minutes later, when Lexa’s post remains unacknowledged but the little blue thumb icon appears underneath Raven’s comment with Clarke’s name next to it.

* * *

Clarke is back at school on Monday morning, almost as if she was never gone. There’s no indication that she missed a day of classes for the first of many life-saving medical treatments, no missing hair, no hospital gown or big sign around Clarke’s neck saying  _ I had chemo _ . And Lexa curses herself for even thinking that things would be different.

(She decides that Clarke’s pale skin and tired eyes are just a figment of the imagination that is looking for something different in Clarke’s appearance.)

“Hey,” Lexa greets Clarke in their first class of the day. “How was the … uh, the treatment?”

Raising a single eyebrow at Lexa, Clarke replies, “You can call it chemo. That’s what it is.”

“Sorry,” apologises Lexa, feeling the mild burn along her cheekbones that is no doubt accompanied by a pinkening of the skin there. “I’m just new to all of this.”

She regrets the words the very second that they leave her mouth. The way that Clarke’s face falls, disappointment filling her blue eyes as her brow knits into a furrowed frown, is enough to inform Lexa that what she has just said was insensitive on every level.

“ _ You’re _ new to this?” Clarke asks, her voice soft but laced with bitterness.

“Sorry, I didn’t mean it like that,” Lexa says dejectedly. “That was insensitive of me.”

Lexa is more disappointed in herself that she would care to admit. She’s spent more than a little bit of time this weekend on her laptop, googling questions like  _ what to say to a friend with cancer _ and the overwhelming number one piece of advice she could find was to not make it about herself and how she feels about Clarke’s diagnosis. And yet, all that research is for nothing as she lets herself down within the first thirty seconds.

“It’s fine,” Clarke assures her, though Lexa can’t help but feel that this isn’t fine at all, nor will it ever be until Clarke’s treatment finishes and she gets the all clear in however many months’ time. “I get it, you want help but don’t know how. The best thing you can do is to just act normal.” Lexa nods along earnestly as Clarke reaches out a hand and rests it tenderly on Lexa’s forearm, before continuing. “And Lexa, I appreciate what you’re trying to do. You’re treating me like a human, not like a time bomb. That’s more than I can say for most of the rest of the assholes in this school.”

“I’m sorry,” Lexa attempts to apologise a final time, but the arrival of the teacher for the start of the lesson means that she isn’t given the chance to take her apology any further.

* * *

 

“By all means, come on in,” Clarke says to Raven, pushing open her bedroom door as she leads her best friend inside. “But fair warning, it looks and smells like a hospital.”

Clarke wrinkles her own nose as she steps into her bedroom, the nasty smell of cleaning product invading her nostrils. Her bedroom doesn’t really feel like home much at the moment, the various medications prescribed to her for combatting the side effects of chemo scattered haphazardly across all available surfaces in the room. The smell, despite her desperate pleas, comes from her mother’s insistence of giving the room a thorough disinfect almost every other day so that Clarke doesn’t catch anything while her immune system is reduced.

“Jesus Christ,” Raven blanches as she follows Clarke into the room, lifting her hand up to her face to cover her nose and mouth. “Do you not have any air freshener?”

“I’ve asked my mom to get me some,” Clarke answers. “She insists on keeping this place spotless. I’m already sick, a few germs isn’t going to do any harm.”

Raven’s hand reaches out to Clarke’s, her fingers clasping around Clarke’s wrist to get her full attention.

“Hey. No. Mama G is a medical professional, you listen to what she has to say, okay?”

“Jesus, Raven,” Clarke whines, dropping onto the bed with a plop that rumples the freshly washed sheets. “Are  _ you _ my mom now?”

Raven launches herself belly first onto the mattress next to Clarke, propping her head up with one elbow as she sends a wicked smile in Clarke’s direction.

“Shut up,” says Raven, rolling over onto her back, where she steals half of the pillows and cushions that decorate Clarke’s double bed and sets them up against the headboard behind her. “Are we gonna watch a movie or what? It’s so awesome that you’ve finally got a TV in your room.”

Shrugging and reaching for the remote control that sits on top of a pile of untouched pamphlets from the hospital, Clarke points it at the brand new television that sits on top of the dresser against the opposite wall and says, “Cancer perks.”

* * *

The end of the school year and the start of the summer break between Clarke’s junior and senior years of high school comes around two weeks later, shortly after her second chemotherapy appointment, and Clarke has never been more grateful to have a couple of months off school.

She can already feel some of the changes in her body – most notable is just how lethargic she’s starting to feel. Clarke has always been the number one advocate for power naps but since starting the treatment, she’s found herself passing out pretty much everywhere, including in class, though two hours of calculus on a Monday morning is probably enough to send anybody to sleep.

The other thing is her hair. It hasn’t started to fall out yet, not properly, but Clarke has started to notice a bit of thinning. Each pull of her hairbrush through the newly-dyed pink hair tugs strands out from her scalp that get caught around the bristles of the brush and when she showers, there is slightly more hair than usual to pull out of the drain at the end. It isn’t noticeable in the mirror yet, but Clarke knows that the worst part – when actual clumps of her hair start falling out in uneven patches across her scalp – is almost imminent, and she’s grateful that she won’t have to go to school during this in-between stage.

* * *

Lexa is thankful for the arrival of the summer break. Junior year has been a lot of work and she knows that her final year at high school will be even more tiring. As much as she’s looking forward to throwing herself headfirst into another year of challenging schoolwork and college applications, the two months she has before that to mentally and physically rest is exactly what she needs right now.

And yet, three days after the last day of school, she finds herself already missing the crowded corridors and the uncomfortable plastic chairs.

Well, maybe not those, per se.

She finds herself missing  _ Clarke _ .

Their friendship is by no means rekindled to the level that it was at before they started drifting apart in middle school, but Lexa likes to think that they’ve reached the point once more where they can text each other and make social plans without it being weird.

Clarke, on the other hand, seems to disagree.

**_Lexa_ ** **_  
_ ** _ Are you free today? We could catch a movie or get lunch if you like! Or something else, I’m open to suggestions. _

**_Clarke_ ** **_  
_ ** _ I’m pretty tired actually. Think I’m just gonna stay at home. _

Not yet disheartened, Lexa is already prepared with another suggestion that might suit Clarke a little better.

**_Lexa_ ** **_  
_ ** _ I could come over and we could watch something at yours? _

**_Clarke_ ** **_  
_ ** _ I think I just want to sleep tbh _

Lexa tries to think of something to say,  _ anything _ to let Clarke know that she’s always going to be welcome to hang out with Lexa later, but everything she tries typing out just falls flat. She doesn’t want to seem needy, doesn’t want to force Clarke to exert herself any more than she’s physically capable of doing right now, doesn’t want to make Clarke feel guilty for the way that the side effects of the chemotherapy are inhibiting their social interactions.

She just wants Clarke to know that she isn’t alone.

**_Lexa_ ** **_  
_ ** _ No problem! _

* * *

Clarke stands in front of the mirror and adjusts the beanie on her head for what is probably the hundredth time in the last ten minutes.

“You look good,” Raven says. “Don’t worry about it.”

Except that Clarke is worried. Because Octavia is throwing a party tonight and Clarke has been coerced (by Octavia, by Raven, even by her own mother) into attending and it’s the first time she’s left the house for anything other than a hospital visit in the three weeks since school finished. And the first time in almost as long that Clarke has worn anything except for pyjamas.

Not to mention the fact that it’s the debut of her new hairstyle. If you can even call a patchy buzzcut a hairstyle. Hence the beanie.

“Are you sure people aren’t going to notice?” asks Clarke, turning to look at Raven, who is sprawled across Clarke’s bed, playing on her phone as Clarke gets ready.

Pushing herself up into a seated position, Raven grins up at Clarke and answers, “The only thing people are going to notice is how hot you look. Because  _ damn _ girl.”

“You’re just saying that.”

“I’m not,” Raven insists, shaking her head. “Everybody is going to wish they were you.”

Clarke arches an eyebrow, because she’s pretty certain that there is not a single person in the world who would want to be a kid with cancer.

Raven doesn’t miss the look that Clarke shoots her and she jumps up to her feet, crossing the room to stand beside Clarke as they both look at Clarke’s reflection in the mirror.

“You’re hot,” Raven tells Clarke again. “The colours really suit you, your tits look  _ great _ in that shirt, and you’re totally rocking that beanie. Fuck the cancer, you’re awesome!”

And for just a moment, Clarke believes it.

* * *

Parties aren’t always Lexa’s thing. She not a huge drinker, nor does she like big crowds of people, not to mention the fact that she doesn’t fall into the right social circles to get invited to most of the parties thrown by the kids in her year at school.

But for some reason Octavia Blake, who has never taken the time to talk to Lexa much off the soccer pitch that they share during training for the women’s varsity team, personally insisted that Lexa just  _ had _ to come along to the party that she’s throwing tonight.

It’s not Lexa’s scene at all. Music thumps from two loudspeakers positioned on either side of the living room, questionable drinks are being poured into cups from a large keg being manned by Octavia’s college-aged brother, and sweaty bodies are crammed into every corner of the Blakes’ small house. But Lexa doesn’t get invited to parties often and she’s determined to at least try to enjoy this one.

(Her attendance has absolutely nothing to do with the possibility that tonight might be the first time she sees Clarke since school finished for the summer.  _ Nothing _ .)

There’s a big shout from the already quite tipsy Octavia when Raven arrives at the party, and Lexa’s eyes desperately squint towards the door for Clarke.

And there she is.

Oh boy.

Lexa doesn’t know if it’s the jungle juice catching up with her or if the sight of Clarke entering the room behind Raven is really  _ that _ mesmerising, but her head starts to swim a little bit. Clarke looks a little thinner than before, a little more tired, but Lexa hardly notices that because Clarke is still just as beautiful as ever. There’s a dark gray beanie pulled over her head, hiding her hair (or lack of it, as Lexa quickly realises may be the case), but it just emphasises everything else. The sharp plane of Clarke’s jaw. The blue in Clarke’s haggard eyes. The dip of the neckline on Clarke’s rather revealing tank top.

Jesus Christ, when did Lexa become so fucking  _ gay _ .

Lexa’s heart is racing, and the only thing that stops her from passing out, or from locking herself in a quiet and soundproof room for the duration of the party, is that Clarke has an expression on her face that matches the same startled-slash-terrified feeling that Lexa has too.

And so Lexa pushes her own anxiety aside and makes it her main aim to make Clarke feel as comfortable as possible in this scary new environment. Lexa takes a sip from her drink for courage, then plasters a smile on her face as she pushes through the crowd to cross the room and welcome Clarke.

“Clarke!” Lexa beams, her smile genuine as she throws her arms around Clarke’s neck in a greeting. “I didn’t know if you’d be here tonight.”

Lexa didn’t know, but she hoped.

“Yeah, Raven came to my house and basically dragged me out of bed,” Clarke shrugs. “Also, my mom threatened to cut off the wifi at home if I didn’t leave the house. She’s worried I’m becoming a recluse. I swear parents are supposed to worry about kids going to wild parties and getting involved in underage drinking and sex, but apparently when you get cancer they actively encourage it.”

“Then why are you complaining?” Lexa teases Clarke. She gestures towards the kitchen, then asks, “Do you want something to drink?”

Clarke squints at the plastic cup in Lexa’s hand, inspecting its contents with a wary gaze, before she answers, “Sure. Why not?”

Clarke’s hand seeks her own so that they don’t get separated as they slowly navigate their way through the mass of drunk teenagers, and Lexa tries to ignore the erratic pounding of her heart in her chest and the feeling of Clarke’s warm palm against her own. It’s stupid to get so worked up about such meaningless platonic intimacy, but this is Clarke, who gets Lexa’s pulse racing by just  _ looking _ at her. Lexa knows that being with Clarke in that way is beyond her wildest dreams, but even an act as simple as having Clarke’s hand squeezing her own as she leads Lexa towards the kitchen, is more than Lexa thinks she deserves.

“Are you having another?” Clarke asks, when they make it to the keg where Bellamy is pouring his homemade concoction into plastic cups and distributing it to the teenagers that surround him.

Lexa glances down at the cup in her hand and takes a moment to think, before knocking bag the dregs at the bottom and nodding as she passes it across to Bellamy for a refill.

“So,” says Clarke, when they both have their drinks, leading the way out of the kitchen and through the glass doors into the back yard, where the music is quieter and the air much cooler than the warmth indoors that feels heavy with the scent of cheap alcohol and teenage sweat. “You seemed surprised to see me here tonight, but I’ve never seen  _ you _ at a party before.”

“Yeah, parties aren’t usually my thing.”

They reach the far side of the yard, where a rusty swing set stands under the branches of a tall oak tree, and Clarke sits on the seat, looping one of her arms around the chain to keep herself steady, while Lexa stands nearby.

“What’s different about tonight?” asks Clarke.

“Octavia was very persuasive,” replies Lexa. She takes a quick swig of her drink for courage, and then continues, “And I was hoping you’d be here. I wanted to see you. To know that you’re doing okay.”

The cover of the darkness, lit only by the crescent moon ad a few twinkling stars in the sky, does a good job of hiding the blush that rises to Lexa’s cheeks when she confesses that seeing Clarke was a motivator for pushing herself beyond her usual comfort zone.

“I’ve been bad at replying to your messages,” says Clarke. “And I’m sorry for that. Sometimes I just don’t have any energy and then I forget and…”

“No!” Lexa protests quickly, holding up a hand to stop Clarke before she can apologise any further. “You don’t have to say sorry. I probably text you  _ way _ too much.”

“I like that you message me,” Clarke says in a soft voice. “It’s nice that you think of me.”

“Of course I think about you,” says Lexa, laughing softly under her breath, because there is hardly a moment that goes by where Lexa isn’t thinking about Clarke, even subconsciously. “You’re … I mean, you’re  _ you _ .”

“What do you mean by that?” Clarke asks, an inquisitive smile on her face.

Lexa’s cheeks burn in embarrassment and she’s grateful that it’s late enough that the shroud of darkness hides her red-tinged cheeks.

“You’ve always been special,” Lexa shrugs as she answers, avoiding eye contact with Clarke out of fear that she’ll fluster and stumble over her words. “You were my first friend in Kindergarten. Do you remember that?”

“I do,” replies Clarke, and when Lexa finally looks up, it is to find Clarke grinning fondly at the memory. “Murphy pushed you over and I kicked him in the balls.”

“My hero,” says Lexa, mockingly fluttering her lashes in Clarke’s direction.

“God, even back then you were an adorable nerd,” Clarke teases, taking a swig from the plastic cup in her hand.

“Wait, you think I’m adorable?”

“I don’t think I said that,” Clarke denies resolutely, though Lexa can see that she’s trying to fight a smile that gives away the truth.

“You definitely said that,” insists Lexa.

“I also called you a nerd,” Clarke reminds Lexa matter-of-factly.

“Yes, but that’s old news.”

They fall into silence, and as Clarke gently pushes herself back and forth on the swing with her feet against the lawn, all Lexa can see are flashes of memories from years past, of two small girls chasing each other around the nearby playground and seeing who can fly the highest on the swings before losing their nerve.

“I’ve missed this,” says Lexa, smiling to herself at the memory. “Missed us.”

“So have I,” agrees Clarke, scraping her feet against the grass to bring herself to a standstill. “We should do this more often. Hang out, I mean. If you’d like to.”

Lexa’s eyes widen in surprise.

“Yeah, I … I’d love to!”

Lexa can’t remember why she was ever so worried about coming to this party in the first place.

* * *

The thing about promises is that they are easy to make and even easier to break. So when Clarke and Lexa promise to spend more time together, to rekindle a friendship that has been not much more than a pile of ashes since middle school, it’s far too easy to just let things continue how they did before the party.

It’s not that Lexa doesn’t try. Because she does. She sends Clarke occasional messages, links to things she’s seen online that she’s found funny, photos of the mundane happenings in her day to day life, little anecdotes that she thinks Clarke might enjoy. And Clarke replies most of the time, but it’s very rarely more than a one word answer or a laughing face emoji. When it is something more, the conversation fades out within the two or three messages after that.

Lexa tries her best not to push Clarke, because as much as she wants Clarke’s friendship to be the same permanent fixture in her life that it used to be, she also knows that Clarke is having a difficult enough time right now without having to fend off the unwanted attention of a former best friend who has a massive fucking crush on her.

When three weeks have passed since the party, three weeks since they promised to spend a little bit of time together, three weeks in which virtually nothing has changed since before their conversation at the party, Lexa decides to attempt to initiate a face-to-face meeting.

**Lexa Woods** **  
** _ Do you want to hang out later? We could have a movie night? You wouldn’t even have to leave your bed! _

She doesn’t have to wait long for Clarke’s reply.

**Clarke Griffin** **  
** _ Yeah, might be fun _

**Lexa Woods** **  
** _ Cool! I’ll bring popcorn! What time do you want me to come over? _

And that’s it. There isn’t a reply to that message. Lexa checks her phone over and over again, just in case she has accidentally missed the  _ ping _ of her text tone, but there’s still nothing. She assumes that Clarke has fallen asleep, that her message goes unanswered for a completely legitimate reason, but Lexa soon starts to second guess herself and doubt begins to creep into her mind.

Maybe Clarke doesn’t want to hang out with her.

Maybe Lexa is being too pushy.

_ No _ , Lexa tells herself.  _ Clarke likes you. Clarke wants to spend time with you. It’s not her that’s pushing you away, it’s the cancer. _

With that in mind, Lexa slips into her shoes, grabs a jacket, and decides to head over to Clarke’s house.

* * *

When Lexa arrives at the Griffin house, she is nervous.

Nervous that Clarke won’t be in the mood for socialising and that she’ll be turned away at the door.

Nervous that she’s going to be invited inside and will have to somehow find a way to cope with spending two hours watching a movie with a girl that she’s basically in love with.

The fluttering of her heart is almost enough to make Lexa go home of her own accord before she can enter the house.

Lexa musters all of her courage and raises her hand, tapping on the front door sharply with her knuckles. While she waits for somebody to answer the door, Lexa’s heart pounds so hard that she can hear the blood rushing through her ears.

It feels like an eternity that Lexa is waiting on that doorstep, but the door finally swings open and Abby Griffin peers inquisitively at her.

“Hello, can I-?” Abby stops mid-question to peer closer, and recognition seeps across her face as she realises who is on her doorstep. “Lexa?”

“Mrs Griffin,” Lexa nods, smiling politely.

It’s been years since Lexa has been to the Griffin house, years since she’s seen Abby, and though things have changed – there are different cars on the drive, a new rug in the hallway just behind Abby, more gray in Abby’s hair and more crinkled lines around her eyes and mouth – Lexa feels like no time has passed, like she’s still a bright-eyed middle-schooler visiting for a slumber party with stolen candy and whispered secrets beneath the sheets long after the rest of the house has fallen silent.

“Please, call me Abby. And come in!” Abby steps aside, welcoming Lexa into her home and closing the front door behind her, before she continues, “It’s good to see you. It’s been far too long since we had you in this house.”

Lexa nods in agreement, and then asks, “Is Clarke around? We said we’d have a movie night.”

“I haven’t seen her for a while,” Abby answers with a frown, pausing to think before she speaks again. “She came down and made herself some toast just after two but it’s been quiet since then. She’s probably been sleeping.”

“Oh, okay,” says Lexa, trying to mask her disappointment.

“You can go up and see her if you like,” suggests Abby. Abby’s eyes widen as she has an idea, and she explains to Lexa, “I tell you what, I haven’t planned any dinner tonight so we could order pizza for your movie night. How does that sound? Why don’t you go and wake Clarke and ask her what she wants on her pizza? You remember where Clarke’s room is, don’t you?”

“That sounds great,” says Lexa, the anxiety from earlier starting to be replaced with comfort as Abby makes her feel welcome in the place that used to feel like a second home.

She can only hope that Clarke does the same.

Leaving Abby alone downstairs, Lexa ascends the staircase to the upper floor of the house and makes her way to the door that she knows leads to Clarke’s bedroom. And yet again, she hesitates outside the door as nerves begin to rise within her gut at what she might find inside.

After two deep breaths, Lexa knocks lightly on the door and then, when there is no response, she pushes it open and peers inside.

Clarke is asleep. That much is apparent straight away. Her eyes are closed, her mouth slightly agape, and she snores softly. One of her arms is flung casually above her head on the pillow, while Lexa can just see a few toes decorated with chipped red nail polish peeking out from beneath the covers at the foot of the bed.

The most glaringly obvious thing in the room, and Lexa tries her best not to stare at it for too long, is that Clarke has no hair.

Lexa always knew that Clarke was going to end up losing her hair at some point, but she immediately regrets not preparing herself for the sight. Clarke’s scalp is stubbly, like the hair has been shaven close to her scalp at some point in the last few weeks, but the little hair that remains is thin and wispy, like that of a newborn baby before their proper hair starts to grow in thick. It only adds to the childlike image that Lexa gets of Clarke, sprawled out on her bed like an infant taking a nap, and Lexa wants nothing more than to wrap Clarke up in bundles of blanket as she presses soft kisses to her forehead and whispers promises to keep her safe.

Grateful that Clarke is asleep and therefore unable to witness Lexa staring at her almost-hairless head, Lexa forcibly drags her eyes away from the sleeping girl and takes in the rest of the room. Though it’s still the same room that Lexa remembers from her childhood visits, it’s much different. The room feels smaller and less inviting, is Lexa’s first impression. It smells clinical in here, but that’s not it. Across the dresser, there are an assortment of medicines in bottles and boxes, labelled with names that are just as terrifying as they are long. Lexa had no idea that cancer treatment required so much medication.

A giant corkboard leans against Clarke’s closet door, upon which Lexa can see various information pamphlets from the hospital pinned up with brightly coloured pins. Most of the corkboard is dominated by a huge yearly wall planner, which Clarke has decorated with coloured stickers to denote which medicines she needs to take on which days, as well as written in all of her hospital appointments. At the bottom of the board, there’s a handwritten sign that says  _ 12 days to next treatment _ , with a homemade flip chart to change the numbers as she counts down. Around the edge of the board, Clarke has pinned up a few inspirational quotes, and Lexa smiles to herself as she reads one in particular -  _ scars are like tattoos but with cooler stories _ .

It’s all very strange to Lexa, seeing the evidence of Clarke’s cancer all over the same bedroom that she used to have playdates and slumber parties with Clarke in, but the reality of it sinks in a little more that it has before. Lexa feels a tinge of sadness at the realisation that this is what Clarke’s life has become now, but also a huge swell of admiration for how Clarke is refusing to let the cancer take her down without a fight.

When Lexa glances back at the girl still soundly asleep in the bed, she feels as though she’s looking at her in a different light.

“Clarke?” Lexa says in a hushed voice, crossing the room and sitting down gently on the edge of Clarke’s bed, trying not to cause the mattress to jolt suddenly under her weight as she takes a seat. Lexa is torn between wanting to wake Clarke up to spend time with her or leaving her to continue her peaceful slumber, but it is the selfish part of her brain that wins out in the end. “Clarke, it’s me. Lexa.”

Clarke stirs ever so slightly and Lexa reaches out with one hand to brush the back of her fingers against Clarke’s warm cheek, stroking the soft skin tenderly. Clarke leans into the touch, and her bleary eyes flicker open just a fraction.

“Your mom is going to order pizza for dinner,” explains Lexa. “Does that sound okay?”

Clarke lets out a little grunt that Lexa assumes is an affirmative, and so she continues her line of questioning.

“Great, what do you want on yours?”

“Cheese,” mumbles Clarke sleepily.

“Just cheese?” Lexa asks for clarification. “No other toppings?”

“No.”

Clarke rolls onto her side towards Lexa, tucking her legs up to her chest as she curls up and pulls the covers over her shoulder. Her eyes are closed once more, as if she never stirred at all.

“Do you want me to leave you to sleep?” asks Lexa, her voice just a whisper as she tries not to startle the sleepy girl beside her.

Clarke lets out a low hum that Lexa interprets as an affirmative, and Lexa slowly gets to her feet, careful not to disturb Clarke as she crosses the room and backs out into the hallway, closing the bedroom door with a soft click.

Once she is back downstairs, Lexa relays Clarke’s pizza order to Abby, as well as her own, then takes a seat on the couch in the Griffin’s living room.

“She’s fast asleep,” Lexa says, once Abby has phoned the pizza restaurant and placed their order. “It was almost like she was talking to me in her sleep.”

“She does that,” nods Abby. “Sometimes I can go into her room and have an entire conversation with her and she’ll have no recollection of it when we speak later in the day.”

“Wow,” gasps Lexa. “She must be really out of it. Does she spend a lot of time asleep, then?”

“You could say that,” Abby laughs softly under her breath. “Now, Clarke has  _ always _ enjoyed her sleep. It’s difficult enough to get her out of bed in the morning at the best of times, but since she started the treatment, she spends most of the day in bed. She’ll surface a couple of times a day for a snack, but it’s rare to see her awake for more than a few hours at a time.”

“I…” Lexa starts, but then trails off, wondering if the way her thoughts are going aren’t appropriate for a conversation with the mother of a cancer patient. But Abby looks at her with warmth in her eyes and an encouraging smile on her face, and it makes Lexa feel a little like there  _ isn’t _ a wrong thing that she can say, and so she continues, “This is probably going to sound really ignorant, but I’ve never known anybody with cancer before, and seeing somebody go through all of this is so different to how I imagined it to be. I don’t mean that to sound so…”

“No, Lexa, there’s no need to say sorry!” Abby is quick to shut Lexa down for she can start apologising. “I’m a doctor – I deal with people suffering from all sorts of things on a daily basis, and I even did a placement in an oncology ward when I was a student doctor – and there are things about Clarke’s treatment and the side effects that surprise  _ me _ .”

Lexa smiles gratefully at Abby’s words, and then continues, “It’s just, media makes it seem like cancer is about your hair falling out and being connected to a machine by a tube.”

“And there is an element of that to it,” Abby interjects.

Nodding, Lexa adds, “But it seems like it’s so much more than that.”

“There is,” agrees Abby. “You also have to remember that not everybody experiences cancer in the same way, so the way that Clarke’s body responds to the chemicals fighting off the disease is not necessarily the same way that mine would, or yours.”

“Clarke is … I know it’s stupid for  _ me  _ to be saying this when it’s mostly my fault that we aren’t as close as we used to be.”

“Lexa,” says Abby, reaching across the space between them on the couch and resting a comforting hand on Lexa’s arm. “You and Clarke have been an important part of each other’s lives. It’s perfectly natural for you to be affected by what she’s going through.”

Lexa smiles gratefully, Abby’s words doing a little to quell the guilt that Lexa feels for finding it difficult to talk or even think about Clarke’s health.

“Clarke is special,” Lexa confesses to Abby. “Clarke has always been there for me. She’s been looking out for me since the day that we met, and it feels like it’s my turn to repay that favour, to look out for  _ her _ .” Lexa pauses, before she admits, “And I’m worried about her. She doesn’t seem the same as she used to be.”

Lexa wonders for a moment if she has said the wrong thing, when Abby’s brows furrows and her eyes fill with sadness at the changes she’s seeing in her only daughter.

“She’s not,” agrees Abby. “And she may never be. But whatever she may seem like now, she’s going to be a much stronger person when it’s all over.”

Lexa is reminded of another one of the quotes she saw pinned to Clarke’s corkboard up in her bedroom -  _ Cancer is always going to lose, because though it tries to make you weaker it only ends up making you stronger. _

“To quote Kelly Clarkson;  _ what doesn't kill you makes you stronger _ ,” says Lexa, and Abby laughs softly at her words.

“Mom?”

They both startle at the sound of Clarke’s voice, having not heard her descend the stairs, and look up to find Clarke rubbing her tired eyes as she enters the room,  wearing pyjama pants and an oversized hoodie.

“Who are you talking to? I thought Dad was away toni-” Clarke stops mid-sentence when she notices Lexa. “Lexa?”

Lexa gives a meek little wave. Clarke looks completely surprised to see Lexa in her living room, as if she doesn’t remember either inviting Lexa over or even the short conversation that they shared in her room earlier. Lexa remembers what Abby said about Clarke often having entire conversations that she’s too tired to remember later and realises that must be the case.

“Told you she wouldn’t remember,” Abby's says, quiet enough that only Lexa can hear her.

“I came up to your room earlier to ask you what you wanted on your pizza,” Lexa explains to Clarke, smiling kindly in an attempt to reassure Clarke that it’s completely fine if she doesn’t remember. “We had a conversation.”

“We did?”

“Pizza is on its way,” says Abby. “Probably about half an hour.”

“I don’t know if I’m hungry,” Clarke protest, her voice feeble. She drops into one of the armchairs and curls her knees up to her chest, wrapping her arms around them to keep them close to her body as her head drops back against the cushion behind her.

“That’s fine,” Abby tells her. “But it’s there for you if you want it. Lexa says you two are having a movie night.”

“Oh shit, I totally forgot about that!” sighs Clarke, eyes widening as she remembers inviting Lexa over.

“Language, Clarke!” Abby scolds Clarke, though there isn’t actually any trace of anger in her voice.

“Sorry,” mumbles Clarke.

“I can go if you want me to,” says Lexa, trying to mask the disappointment as she makes to get up onto her feet.

“No!” says Clarke quickly, leaning forward in her seat slightly and letting her feet slide onto the floor as if preparing to chase Lexa if she tries to leave. “Stay! Please?”

Lexa drops back into her seat perhaps a little too eagerly, just pleased that she’s finally going to be able to make true of the promise they made at Octavia’s party and spend some time with Clarke. If her heart picks up its pace in her chest, then Lexa vehemently ignores it.

“Let’s use the den,” says Clarke. The Griffins have a room at the back of their house that they call the ‘den’, a small-ish room with a couch, a television, and several towering bookshelves along one wall, and Lexa remembers the room well from her childhood visits here, she remembers eating chips in front of cartoons, and making a fort to hide from the grown-ups. “My bedroom is too much like a prison.”

Lexa nods, her only concern being Clarke’s comfort at all times. If Clarke would rather host their movie night in the den, rather than the bedroom that has become almost like her own private hospital ward at home, then Lexa isn’t going to put forward any complaints.

“That sounds like a great idea,” says Abby. “Why don’t you girls go and set up in there? There’s some spare blankets and pillows up in the spare bedroom if you want to make it more comfy in there. I can bring the pizza to you when it arrives.”

“Thank you, Mrs Griffin,” says Lexa.

“It’s Abby,” replied Abby, a twinkle in her eyes, “and you know that, Lexa!”

* * *

They build what can only be described as a nest on the couch in the den, cocooning themselves in a warm bundle of blankets and cushions while they choose a movie from Netflix. When the pizza arrives, Abby brings it through to them and smiles at the sight of their heads peering out from under all the blankets.

The pizza box sits between them on the couch, resting on a small cushion, and they help themselves to cheesy slices while the movie plays in the background. Despite her earlier protests that she wouldn’t be hungry, Clarke’s stomach gives a traitorous growl when they lift the lid, and she manages almost two slices before she gives in and says that her appetite has gone.

Clarke falls asleep about halfway through the movie, and with her stomach full and the nest of blankets keeping her cosy, Lexa can feel her own eyes drooping with the onset of drowsiness not too long afterwards. She tries to fight it, to stay away and watch the movie, but her eyelids are heavy and she quickly succumbs.

* * *

When Clarke wakes up, she is uncomfortable.

Which is weird because she’s bundled up in blankets on the soft couch cushions in the den, with Lexa fast asleep against her side. She should be the  _ epitome _ of comfort.

There’s an unsettled feeling in Clarke’s stomach, and it takes her a few sleepy moments to realise that she feels nauseous. The need to be sick is not an urgent one, but it is there, but as soon as she realises that she’s feeling queasy, it takes over her entire body and she can’t think of anything else.

Clarke tries to extract herself from the blankets without disturbing Lexa, but with the other girl asleep against her side, her head resting on Clarke’s shoulder, it’s a harder task that it seems. The blankets are tangled around their limbs and as she tries to remove herself from their warmth, Lexa stirs against her and her eyes blink open.

“Are you okay?” Lexa asks, her voice raspy in her newly awakened state.

“Just gonna go to the bathroom,” Clarke says, trying not to let her discomfort show. The last thing she wants is for Lexa to worry about her.

Lexa looks on in concern, but she nods silently and lets Clarke leave, helping to remove the blankets so that she can make her escape.

Clarke knows the drill by now. She reaches for a hair tie and pushes her hair back into a loose bun, then sits on the edge of the bathtub within reach of the toilet basin. She takes deep breaths, trying to stop the bile from rising in her throat, but by this point she knows it’s going to happen.

When she can’t fight it anymore, Clarke leans over the basin and retches, emptying the contents of her stomach into the toilet bowl. When she doesn’t think she can be sick any longer, when there is nothing left to throw up, Clarke scrabbles with one hand for the flush, while the other reaches for a square of toilet paper to wipe the disgusting dribble from her chin and lips.

“Clarke?”

As if things couldn’t get any worse, Clarke glances up from where she is huddled on the bathroom floor to find Lexa leaning against the doorway with concern on her face. The very reason that Clarke rarely has friends over at her house is because she doesn’t want them to see her like this, but the illusion that she’s dealing with cancer with her dignity still in tact is lost the moment that Lexa lays eyes on the way that Clarke is clinging to the toilet seat with her own drool coating her lips.

“Go away, Lexa,”

“Can I do anything to help? Do you need anything? Water?”

Clarke is loathe to ask for help, but her throat burns and there’s an acidic taste in her mouth and water sounds like heaven.

“There’s a bottle of water that I left in the den,” Clarke reluctantly says to Lexa.

“I’ll go get it.”

Lexa hurries out of the bathroom obediently like a dog rushing to fetch a ball, and Clarke is only left alone for a moment because the commotion brings her mom along in Lexa’s absence. Abby enters the bathroom and takes a seat on the edge of the bathtub, rubbing a soothing hand up and down Clarke’s back.

“Clarke, are you okay honey?” she asks.

Clarke glances up and puts on a forced smile, as she replies sarcastically, “Peachy.”

Lexa returns with the water bottle, filled with fresh water, and gives it to Clarke with a worried expression still on her face. Clarke accepts the bottle with a grateful nod of her head and takes a huge gulp, swilling the water around her mouth to wash away the taste of her own vomit, before she spits the water into the toilet basin and takes another sip to actually drink.

“Lexa, I don’t want you to see me like this,” says Clarke, now that her throat isn’t quite so dry and scratchy.

Though Lexa looks as though she wants to say something, she remains silent.

Pushing herself up into a standing position, it is Abby who comes up with a solution, leaving Clarke on the bathroom floor beside the toilet as she says to Lexa, “Lexa, how about I make up the spare room for you and you can sleep there tonight?”

Lexa keeps staring at Clarke with a frown on her face, eyes full of pity and something else, before she finally glances up at Abby and nods silently. Abby ushers Lexa out of the bathroom, leading her down the hallway, and it is only when Clarke has been left alone in the bathroom that she lets herself break down, tears cascading down her cheeks and her chest heaving with sobs as she collapses on the bathroom floor and just cries.

* * *

School starts up again at the end of the summer and so begins Lexa’s senior year.

Clarke doesn’t show up on the first day, nor on the second, and when she does finally show her face on the third day, she looks wearier than Lexa remembers, and her words are much more negative.

“I just don’t want to be here,” complains Clarke, when Lexa meets with her during morning break to give her a copy of Lexa’s notes from the two days she’s missed. “I don’t see the point.”

“Of course there’s a point!” Lexa tries to assure her. “This is senior year, your last year!”

“And what?” shrugs Clarke dejectedly, slumping against her locker. “I have to miss school for appointments but what about the days like yesterday where I physically couldn’t get out of bed? I’m tired all the fucking time!”

“I’m sure the teachers will be able to help you catch up on the work you’ve missed,” Lexa suggests.

“The teachers don’t give a shit,” replies Clarke. “I’m not in school enough for them to care. They’ve already written me off as a hopeless case. I’m just a kid they’ll talk about in a few years, like ‘remember when we taught that girl with cancer, such a sad story’. That’s all I am to them, a story.”

“Then I’ll help you!” promises Lexa. She hates seeing Clarke like this, hates how the cancer seems to have drained all of Clarke’s positivity. “I can come over to yours and help with the stuff that you miss and it’ll even help with my own revision.”

“I can’t ask you do so that.”

“I want to,” Lexa shrugs, her voice soft.

Clarke looks at Lexa in confusion, her eyebrows furrowed into a frown, like she’s trying to work out why Lexa hasn’t written her off in the same way that nearly every other person in the school has.

“But why? There’s no point. My life lost all its worth the moment they did the scan and found a tumour.”

Clarke chokes on her words towards the end, and Lexa catches her reaching up to rub at her eyes, as if wiping away tears. Within a few seconds, Clarke’s chest is heaving with sobs and her cheeks are damp.

“Come on,” says Lexa, putting an arm around Clarke’s shoulder and guiding her into the nearby girls’ bathroom.

There are two girls in there when they enter, standing at the mirrors touching up their eyeliner, but upon seeing Clarke in tears, they seem to sense the need for privacy and quickly gather their belongings, vacating the bathroom to leave Lexa and Clarke alone.

“It’s okay,” Lexa soothes Clarke. “Let it out.”

“Why me?” sobs Clarke. “What did I do to deserve this?”

“Nothing” says Lexa, as she pulls Clarke in for a hugs and wraps her arms around Clarke’s shoulders. Clarke’s own arms circle loosely around Lexa’s waist and her head falls on Lexa’s shoulder, her tears soaking the sleeve of Lexa’s t-shirt. “You did nothing. You don’t deserve any of this and it makes me so mad that it’s happening to you.”

“I had it all planned out,” says Clarke, another sob tearing through her body as she trembles in Lexa’s arms. “I was going to get a good GPA and go to med school and become a paediatrician but none of that is going to happen anymore.”

“It can still happen if you want it to,” Lexa tries to reassure Clarke.

Clarke pulls herself out of Lexa’s embrace and walks into one of the toilet stalls, emerging a few seconds later with some toilet paper scrunched up in her hand, which she uses to dab at her eyes and then blow her nose.

“That’s the other thing,” Clarke says to Lexa, tossing the used tissue in the nearby trash can. “I’m not sure I even  _ want _ to be a doctor anymore. Why would I want to spend the rest of my life working in a place that reminds me of what I’m going through now?”

“Then that’s fine,” Lexa answers without hesitation. “There’s still so many other things you can so. You can still go to college without deciding what you want to major in yet, or you don’t have to go to college at all if you don’t want to.”

Clarke’s eyes narrow and she looks at Lexa with an expression on her face like she doesn’t understand why Lexa is so insistent that Clarke’s life isn’t as bad as she thinks it is.

“Why are you doing this?”

“Doing what?” asks Lexa.

“Being so nice to me.”

Clarke still looks at Lexa with incredulity in her eyes, like the very idea of somebody showing her kindness is one that she can’t begin to fathom.

“Do you remember in Kindergarten when you helped me up after Murphy pushed me over and then kicked him in the balls?” asks Lexa, and Clarke’s glistening blue eyes soften with traces of amusement as she nods through her tears. “You’ve always had my back and now that things aren’t so great for you, I want to have yours.”

Lexa omits the part where she’s basically in love with Clarke and would do  _ anything  _ to ensure her happiness.

“I mean, Murphy hasn’t done anything but if you want to kick him in the balls anyway, it would really cheer me up.”

“Noted,” smiles Lexa.

Though her cheeks are blotchy and there are red rings around her eyes as evidence of her tears, Clarke is no longer crying and Lexa is grateful that she seems to have cheered up a little. She thinks that seeing Clarke like that, seeing the  _ emotional _ impact that the cancer is having on her, is far worse than it is to see all of the physical changes on Clarke’s body. Even seeing Clarke hunched over a toilet bowl emptying her stomach that time Lexa went over for a movie night was more bearable than this, because at least Lexa knew that the nausea would pass. Seeing Clarke so upset and feeling like there is nothing she can do to help only leaves Lexa feeling completely helpless, and she wishes that there could be steps for her to take to ensure that Clarke doesn’t have to feel like her life isn’t worth anything now that she’s sick.

“Seriously, though,” Lexa tells Clarke, who has now turned to the sink and is splashing water over her face from the faucet. “I’m here for you. I know that things aren’t going your way at the moment, but I don’t want you to ever feel like you’re alone, because you’re not.”

Clarke’s eyes are still red and the skin around them puffy from her tears, but there’s something much deeper in them as she looks at Lexa, like maybe she might be finally starting to believe that what Lexa is saying is true.

* * *

Something changes in Clarke.

Lexa hardly notices it at first, because in many ways nothing changes at all. Clarke still misses a lot of school and when she does show up, she is still just as weary and down about her situation as she was at the start of the school year, keeping her head down on her desk for often entire lessons and secluding herself from most of her peers during break and lunchtimes.

But there’s definitely something different too. Something in the way that Clarke’s eyes seek out Lexa’s in the school canteen and her tense shoulders relax visibly as she comes to sit at Lexa’s table. Something in the way that Clarke will always choose to sit next to Lexa in the classes that they share, even if she ends up sleeping on her desk for the entire lesson. Something in the way that Clarke has started inviting Lexa over to hers after school every now and then so that Lexa can help her with the work she’s missed, even though their ‘study sessions’ usually end up with them binge-watching TV and reminiscing about memories from years past until their cheeks hurt from smiling too much.

Lexa likes it. Well, she doesn’t like that Clarke is still struggling, but she likes the way that even though Clarke is having a tough time, she’s giving Lexa the chance to try and make it a little less difficult.

* * *

Clarke has her last treatment in early-November and Lexa spends the entire day glued to her phone. Or at least as glued to her phone as she can be at school without the teachers noticing it and confiscating it from her. She checks it as often as she can, waiting for a message from Clarke to say that she’s out of the hospital so that she can congratulate Clarke on making it to the end of a gruelling six months of chemotherapy.

There isn’t a message, but when Lexa checks Facebook during her lunch break, there’s a post from Clarke at the top of her feed, dominated by a goofy selfie of Clarke at the hospital with a dumb filter that distorts her face and gives her a pair of animal ears.

Lexa taps the ‘like’ button instantly, then scrolls down to read the caption that Clarke has posted below.

**Clarke Griffin** ****  
**34 minutes ago** _  
_ _ Last ever chemo today! It’s been a difficult six months but I’m coming out the other side stronger and I couldn’t have done it without the most incredible support from the best friends and family I could ask for. Thank you to each and every one of you for sticking by my side during these tricky months. I love you all! All there’s left to do is to wait for the scan to confirm that the cancer is gone and then I can start growing my eyebrows back! _

Lexa’s eyes prickle with tears and she wipes them away immediately, before anybody else can see her crying in the middle of the school canteen, but Lexa can’t stop the smile that spreads across her face with the growing pride that she feels for Clarke and the struggle that she has overcome as she types out a comment on Clarke’s post.

**Lexa Woods** **  
** _ So proud of you and the strength that you’ve shown! <3 _

It doesn’t come close to expressing what Lexa is  _ really _ feeling, but when the notification pops up a few seconds later telling her that Clarke has replied with a heart emoji of her own, Lexa hopes that maybe it’s just about enough.

* * *

On the day that Clarke goes for her final scan and gets the all-clear from the doctors, who tell her that the chemotherapy has been successful and that she’s in complete remission, they go for milkshakes and donuts to celebrate.

“To you,” says Lexa, holding up her milkshake glass when the waitress brings them their drinks, and Clarke meets it with a soft clink of her own against Lexa’s, “for being the strongest and bravest person I know and kicking cancer’s butt.”

“To  _ you _ ,” adds Clarke, keeping her glass raised even after Lexa lowers her own, “for sticking by my side when so many others turned their backs.”

Lexa wraps her lips around the straw and sucks up some of her milkshake, sighing at how refreshing the drink is, before she puts the glass down on the table.

“Of course I stuck by you,” Lexa shrugs. “I just didn’t want you to feel alone.”

“I appreciate it,” smiles Clarke. “As long as we’re still going to be friends now that I’m healthy again?”

Clarke has genuine concern in her eyes, like she actually thinks that Lexa might stop being her friend now that she no longer has the excuse of wanting to help Clarke through her difficult times.

“Of course we are,” Lexa promises Clarke. “I’ll always be your friend, even when you have hair again!”

Clarke’s face cracks open into a grin and Lexa flushes with delight at having made Clarke smile, a sight that has been so rare over the last few months. It’s nice to see Clarke relaxed for once, instead of exhausted and void of hope, and Lexa can’t tell if Clarke is actually more radiant than before or if it’s just Lexa imagining things. Either way, Clarke looks beautiful as she sips on her milkshake, even more so when she smiles, and Lexa is reminded of all the un-friendlike feelings she has for Clarke as her heart stirs in her chest and makes its presence known by thumping rhythmically against her ribcage.

To distract herself from her racing heart, and to stop herself from doing anything stupid like telling Clarke that she looks beautiful and accidentally confessing her love, Lexa gestures to the box of donuts on the table between them and asks, “Powdered sugar or chocolate sprinkles?”

“Like you even have to ask,” grins Clarke, reaching for the donut decorated with chocolate icing and multi-coloured sprinkles.

* * *

The cancer might have gone, but Clarke’s social anxiety definitely has not, and the nerves that she feels upon entering the party that Octavia is throwing at her house for half their year is almost overwhelming. Her hair, barely starting to grow back and still a closely shaven fuzz on her head, is hidden beneath a comfortable gray beanie, and even though it has been months since she had long hair, Clarke still feels self-conscious about her current look.

The other partygoers greet her as if nothing has changed, as if she hasn’t spent months going in and out of hospital appointments and barely showing up to school. There’s the people who have always been her friends, even through it all - Raven wraps Clarke in a tipsy hug when she first sees her, Jasper greets Clarke with a fist bump and offers to pour her a drink from a suspicious-looking homemade concoction stored in an old plastic water bottle, Octavia drags Clarke straight into the middle of a makeshift dance floor in the living room and starts grinding up against her instead of Lincoln - but there’s others, people who have barely acknowledged Clarke during the last six months, who greet her and smile as she passes as if she has never had cancer at all.

It’s weird and Clarke doesn’t like it.

When Clarke has finally managed to escape from Octavia’s inappropriate dancing, using an excuse of needing to go somewhere a little cooler, Clarke makes her way to the slightly quieter kitchen and pours herself a drink.

“So the cancer is gone, huh?”

Clarke glances up, bottle of soda in one hand and a red plastic cup in the other, to find Finn smirking across at her. Finn, who was definitely flirting with her before the diagnosis, but who hasn’t even looked her way since, let alone spoken to her.

“Well,” says Clarke, trying not to let her disinterest in conversing with Finn creep into her voice. “I’m in complete remission, so…”

“So you’re basically cured.”

Clarke knows that she used to be attracted to Finn, though in this moment she can’t possibly remember why. Perhaps the chemotherapy has killed all traces of the former attraction along with the cancer.

“Finn, it…”

“When is your hair going to grow back?” asks Finn.

He must think that he’s flirting, because he wears a smirk on his face and leans closer to Clarke. Clarke decides that they must be living in alternate universes, because Finn clearly thinks that his advances are wanted, while Clarke is struggling to think of anywhere she would rather be less than here with Finn.

Except for perhaps the oncology ward with a tube pumping chemicals into the port on her chest, but it’s an incredibly close call.

“What if I like it short?” Clarke replies haughtily, folding her arms indignantly across her chest.

Still undeterred, Finn says, “I think you look really pretty with long hair. You know, how it was before.”

“Well, if  _ you _ like it short then I guess I have to grow back.”

Finn completely misses the sarcasm in her voice because instead of getting the idea that Clarke doesn’t care about what he has to say and backing off, he instead leans yet closer and says, “How about we go and talk somewhere a little more private?”

It takes all of Clarke’s self-restraint to stop herself from rolling her eyes.

“And by ‘talk’, you mean hook-up?” she asks him, raising her eyebrows in disbelief.

“Well, I guess. If you like.”

Clarke loses it.

“No, Finn,” she snaps, spitting his name out like it’s a nasty taste on her tongue that she can’t wait to be rid of, “I don’t like. I don’t like the way that you think you can ignore me for six months and then as soon as I finish my treatment, you decide that it’s okay to start flirting with me again because you no longer have to deal with a girl who has cancer.”

“Clarke,” whines Finn, “I only meant that…”

“Well, guess what, Finn?” continues Clarke, barely allowing herself time to take a breath before she launches off again, not giving Finn the chance to try to wriggle his way out of this one. “I’m always going to be the girl who had cancer! You don’t go through something like this and just forget about it. This experience has changed me and I’m not the same girl who had a crush on you last summer. And if you didn’t want to be around for that change then that’s on you.”

“Clarke…” protests Finn.

“Finn, I don’t care,” Clarke tells him bluntly. “If you didn’t want to be my friend when I had cancer, then you don’t get to be my friend now that I don’t.”

Clarke is pretty proud of herself for that one, but she becomes aware that her rant at Finn has drawn a little bit of attention from the handful of other people in the kitchen. They watch her with mild fear on their faces, as if worried that she’s going to turn on them next and give them the same kind of treatment that she’s given Finn.

But Clarke is done ranting, and from the way that Finn is finally silent, Clarke thinks that maybe she might have got through to him.

Clarke decides that she has to make a quick exit to escape the judgement of the other people in the kitchen, but when she looks up at the door out of the kitchen, she notices that Lexa is standing there watching her, and Clarke realises that she must have seen the entire exchange with Finn.

With her conversation with Finn fresh in her mind, Clarke realises that Lexa is the only person outside of her tight-knit friendship group who has even looked Clarke’s way during the last few months, let alone tried to support her through the biggest challenge of her entire life, and the realisation has everything clicking into place.

Clarke pushes past Finn and walks towards Lexa, grabbing Lexa’s hand with her own on her way out of the kitchen and pulling Lexa with her.

“Come on, Lexa. We need to talk.”

* * *

_ We need to talk _ .

Put together in that order, they are probably four of the most ominous-sounding words in the English language, but Lexa has no time to process what they might mean or what Clarke wants to talk about. Clarke’s hand grips her own and Lexa is being dragged down the hallway of Octavia’s house, past a few other kids in their year, until Clarke opens up the front door and leads Lexa outside into the chilly December air.

“Clarke, what…?”

Clarke kisses her. Like actually  _ kisses _ her, lips gently moving against Lexa’s while one of her hands comes up to tangle itself in Lexa’s hair.

It’s not at all what Lexa imagined their first kiss to be like - and Lexa has probably imagined and re-imagined a thousand different scenarios in which she and Clarke share a first kiss. Lexa has pictured it being tentative and clumsy, she’s pictured it being fiery and fuelled by lust, she’s pictured it taking place right after Lexa has delivered a smooth line to knock Clarke off her feet, and she’s pictured it happening in the darkness of her own bedroom late at night during a slumber party. In fact, had you asked Lexa just thirty seconds ago, she probably would have said that there is not a single version of their first kiss that she hasn’t already imagined.

But she never once imagined it to be like this, never thought that it would happen on Octavia Blake’s front step while a party rages on behind the closed front door, never expected that Clarke’s lips would be so soft or that her hand would caress Lexa’s scalp in the way that it does, never once predicted that Clarke kissing her would make Lexa’s heart beat in her chest like it’s having its very own high school house party in her chest.

Lexa tries to be as present as she can be, a task which is a lot harder than it seems when her entire body feels like it’s floating off the ground and soaring into space. She tries to kiss Clarke back, and she lifts her own hand to cup Clarke’s jaw, where her fingertips dip just beneath the soft material of the beanie that Clarke wears and her thumb traces patterns along the bone of Clarke’s gaunt cheek.

The kiss is a bit of a surprise - as far as Lexa is aware, her feelings for Clarke have been entirely one-sided until now - and Lexa can’t help but wonder what has changed in Clarke’s mind to bring them to this point. When Clarke draws back from the kiss to change the angle, Lexa pulls back from the kiss, though she keeps her hands on Clarke to hold her close, trying to let Clarke know that this is just a temporary pause, not a permanent halt on their kissing.

“Clarke, what…?

“Finn was hitting on me and it made me realise that there’s only one person I want to be doing that,” explains Clarke. When Lexa stares at her dumbfoundedly for a few seconds, not quite believing what she’s hearing, Clarke elaborates by saying, “You.”

Lexa’s jaw drops open like she can’t quite believe what she’s hearing, even though she already has the physical evidence that Clarke wants her from the way that her lips are still tingling from the recent pressure of Clarke’s mouth sliding against her own.

“Listen, this isn’t going to be easy,” says Clarke, dropping the hand that is buried in Lexa’s hair so that it’s draped around her neck and bringing the other one up to match it. “I still have to go to the hospital for tests every few months and there’s always a chance that the cancer could come back. And I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but mentally I’m a bit of a fuck up right now.”

“Clarke…” protests Lexa, shaking her head.

“What?” shrugs Clarke. “It’s true! I’ve still got a difficult journey ahead of me but I want to make that journey with you. I want you to still be by my side, because I can deal with the cancer - not very well, I admit - but I can deal with it. I don’t think I could handle not having you in my life.”

There’s a question in Clarke’s eyes, as if she’s waiting for Lexa to promise that she’s never going to leave. Lexa can’t find the words to do justice to the way that she’s feeling, so she decides to do it with actions instead. Her hands tighten on Clarke’s waist, pulling her closer as she leans down for a second kiss that feels like Lexa is arriving home.

“Just to be clear,” Lexa mumbles against Clarke’s lips, “are you asking me to be your girlfriend?”

Clarke lets out a little noise, something that Lexa decides must be the audible version of an eye roll, before she answers, “Yes, idiot. Be my girlfriend?”

Lexa doesn’t know how she manages to keep kissing Clarke when her mouth is threatening to crack into a huge grin, but she manages it, only pulling back for long enough to say, “Yes.”

**Author's Note:**

> I'm also on tumblr [@almostafantasia](http://almostafantasia.tumblr.com)


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